No Capes
by ravensradio
Summary: An AU in which the delinquents discover that they possess abilities that they can't begin to understand while a serial killer by the name of Cage is going after heroes of this type.
1. Part One

**CLARKE** was in her studio when it first happened. She was painting a landscape on a canvas when an empty feeling passed over her, yeyes glazing over to form a blank white.

Flashes passed through her mind- scenes of people she didn't know. A brother and sister fighting side by side, a goggled boy and his friend disappearing in mid air, a dark haired girl making the equipment in the workshop around her levitate. Clarke couldn't control herself, she simply had to paint. God knows how many canvases she went through before she woke up from the weird trance, almost covered from head to toe in different colors from her vision induced painting session.

Different scenes lay before her, none of which she could explain. A painting of an intense looking dark haired boy caught her eye first. His curly, messy hair had fallen into his eyes as he looked at his hands, glowing bright as the world around him bursts into flames. The same girl she saw while painting, the one she assumed was his sister stood next to him, face sullen as she backed away from him.

Dozens of canvases littered the floor around her, depicting scenes of the same sort, some were gory and brutal, others seemed to be calm and serene. One thing remained constant in all the pictures- the dark haired boy and his sister.

"I should warn them," Clarke told herself, wondering if the brother and sister were real. She looked closely of a painting of the two on a porch, both of them bloodied and broken, but still together. She read the address that was on the porch and typed it into her smart phone, discovering the precise location of the siblings. Within moments she was planning on driving to New Jersey.

**BELLAMY** was sure Octavia was kidding, but his little sister's face said otherwise.

"Bell, you have to trust me on this one," she insisted, following her brother around the kitchen as he worked on preparing a quick lunch before his shift at what she was sure was the last video rental store in all of New Jersey. "I got Murphy to come out and film it for proof this time. I'm not crazy."

Bellamy sighed, not approving of his sister hanging out with John Murphy, simply because the kid reminded him too much of how he used to be. He stopped stirring the pasta on the stove before turning to face his sister.

"You realize how unbelievable it sounds when you tell me you're incapable of dying, don't you?" Bellamy asked, trying to keep his voice from sounding condescending, because if there was one thing he didn't want to do it was hurting Octavia's feelings.

"As unbelievable as it sounds, it's true," Octavia insisted. She brought out her phone, a nice touchscreen device like all the other kids her age had, the same phone Bellamy had to spend hours of overtime working to pay for. She pulled up the camera roll, and clicked on a video of her standing atop a large rig of some sort out in a desolate area.

"Watch this," she said as she pressed the play button. Bellamy did all he could not to panic as he listened to her scream as she fell from the top of the rig and onto the rough, dusty land below. She had laid there seemingly lifeless for a moment before she stands, arm out of place, neck turned awkwardly, and something that resembled a bone a bit too much sticking out of her chest. Bellamy was frozen in shock as he watched her push the bone back into her skin, relocate her arm, and crack her neck back into place, walking towards the camera like she was having a nice stroll. As she paused the video, Bellamy noted that all her wounds had simply disappeared, leaving only blood as evidence.

"I'm Octavia Blake," she said on the video, breathing labored as she approaches. "And for all you know, that was attempt number one."

Bellamy looked at his sister, incapable of words. He was about to say something about just how grounded she would be when they heard the sizzle of pasta boiling over on the stove and a curt knock on the door.

"I'll get the door, you clean that up," Octavia said as she ran to the front of the house and looked out the window to see a nice car out front their almost decent house.

She opened the door to find a blonde, body covered in dried paint of various colors, some of it almost resembling the color of blood.

"Can I help you?" Octavia asked, looking at the older girl who seemed to be in a state of panic.

"I'm Clarke Griffin, and I think I just painted you," The girl, Clarke, said, and Octavia stepped aside to let her in. It wasn't the craziest thing that's happened, after all.

**RAVEN** was reaching for her wrench that was at the far end of the table, not wanting to overwork her deadweight of a leg by walking there and back. She didn't realize the wrench had flown into her hand until it actually did. Her eyes went wide in shock as she looked around the shop to see if anyone had noticed. No one did, and she realized how lucky she was for that matter. Her uber-religious uncle would have fired her on the spot. In fact, he probably would have accused her of witchcraft too, had he known.

She kept her newfound ability in the back of her mind the whole day, wondering if it was just an illusion her sleep deprived eyes had played on her. Her next attempt was at the end of the day as she eyed her car keys at the hook the exact opposite direction of where her car was parked. To test out her newfound power, she simply raised her hand towards the keys and willed them to her, within seconds she was walking out to her car, keys jangling in her hand.

As she got in the car Raven secretly wondered what would happen if she told someone about her ability, knowing deep down that it wouldn't be good. She knew that she needed to find an expert on this sort of thing before it got out of hand, before it became a hazard to the people around her. She pushed these thoughts to the back of her mind as she left the garage and headed back towards her house, knowing her problem was nothing a bit of research couldn't fix.

Halfway through the ride home she changed the station of the radio with her mind without really meaning to, and at that point she realized she couldn't work with her ability alone. As soon as she got to her apartment she pulled out a phone book and looked up local geneticists, and found a company of geneticists who happened to work out of Manhattan- ARK Research

**JASPER** was working in a cubicle at a phone company with his best friend right beside him when he discovered what he thought to be the best thing to happen to the pair.

Both of them knew they would never be employee of the month, mostly because half the time they came to work they were hungover after late nights with Monty's moonshine and occasionally they brought couple of pot brownies to work to get them through hours of phonecalls. Still, they valued their job because it payed their bills, but sometimes they couldn't help but daydream on the job, after all, they were in their prime.

Jasper was staring at his clock, watching as minutes passed by without anyone calling the help line for the cable company he worked at. As he focused harder, he watched as the clock sped up a bit faster, and five minutes passed in the blink of an eye.

Jasper didn't think anything of it. In the back of his mind he blamed it on the lasting effects of his latest buzz and got back to sitting and waiting for phone calls, letting his mind wander so he could think about what would be for dinner.

"I was thinking tacos," Monty said, peeking his head over the adjoining side of the cubicle.

Jasper raised an eyebrow, admiring how his friend was able to guess just what he was thinking so accurately.

"I know, it's a gift," Monty replied casually, as if oblivious to the fact that Jasper had yet to say anything.

Jasper wondered if his best friend actually possessed the ability to read his mind, and his suspicions were soon to be confirmed.

"Don't be ridiculous Jasper, you've been talking to me the whole-" Monty cut himself off, looking at his wordless friend who was staring at him from his rolling chair.

"I haven't even said a word," Jasper said, half of him in awe, the other half wondering just how much Monty has heard him thinking today.

"What does this mean?" Monty asks, brows furrowing as he tries to recall the point where he suddenly began to hear what people thought.

"This means that you're officially the cooler one of the two of us," Jasper says, standing up from his desk. "How would you feel about ditching work to figure this out?"

Monty gave a sigh of relief glancing back and forth.

"Thank you," He said before dropping his voice to a whisper, "I was getting tired of hearing Bryan in Accounting thinking about what foods are best for indigestion."

**CLARKE** didn't actually know their names until she eavesdropped on the sibling's argument and learned that she had painted Bellamy and Octavia Blake. She sat at their dining table (which she believed had the potential to fall apart any second) and she watched the Blake siblings as they bantered between one another, both occasionally throwing glances at Clarke.

It was a while and a few heavy sighs from Bellamy before she actually got involved in the conversation.

"So you drew us?" Bellamy asked like he was interrogating a criminal. "What did you draw?"

Clarke tried to find the words as she glanced between the siblings, trying to figure out how to explain that she painted them dying and living in so many ways.

"I drew you two dying, different ways, always together. I also drew a few scenes of you in Manhattan," she explained as she retrieved her phone from her purse, opening it to a photo album of all the pictures she took of her paintings.

She handed Bellamy the phone, allowing him to look through the paintings. His brow furrowed as he focused on some of the pictures, and she watched him zoom in on some pictures as Octavia peered over his shoulder, marveling at the images.

"This isn't Octavia," He said, turning to phone to face her. She saw one of the less graphic paintings, one of a girl making metallic objects float in the air as she pointed them towards an unseen foe while Bellamy held glowing hands out in the same direction.

"I'm afraid I don't have the answer as to who that is," Clarke said apologetically. "It was strange. I was painting a still life for a course I'm taking and I saw these flashes of images. The next thing I knew I had about thirteen canvases around me with paintings you two and whoever the other girl is."

Octavia looked at the phone again, eyes brightening as if she had a surge of recognition, which she quickly covered up with a stoic and serious look.

"You're implying that you see the future," Octavia accused, raising an eyebrow at the blonde who happened to be sitting at her chair at the table. "Why should we believe you?"

Clarke thought for a moment, glancing from her phone to the siblings before formulating her response.

"Because the only thing that shocked you two about these painting was the fact that one of the girls in it wasn't you, Octavia," Clarke pointed out, looking up at the girl who couldn't be more than a year younger. "My mom's a geneticist and she's been studying this type of thing since before I was born. Her company, ARK Research Centers specializes in the appearance of genetic anomalies that are causing abilities all over the world. It appears that you have regenerative qualities just like I can apparently see the future. My only question now is what your brother can do."

Clarke turned to Bellamy, who had been listening to every word. He backed up, shaking his head at Clarke's implication.

"I can't do anything," Bellamy insisted. "I'm just a guy who gets paid minimum wage to work at the Video Palace downtown."

"We'll see then, won't we?" Clarke pressed, standing from the table and extending a hand to the older Blake, which he took and shook curtly before walking to the raggedy coat rack that held his Video Palace vest. He pulled it on and grabbed a can of some energy drink from the fridge.

"See Clarke out, Octavia," He said as he walked towards the front door. He turned as he opened the door, flashing Clarke a grin as he called, "By the way, nice lockscreen, Princess."

Clarke flushed as she looked at the background of her phone, which just happened to be her and her roommate Lexa on her 21st birthday, both wearing plastic tiaras and looking drunk out of their minds. She heard the door slam, and the eldest Blake was gone with the turn of an engine outside.

"So," Octavia began, crossing her arms as she looked at Clarke, "You said your mom knows about this kind of stuff, right?"

Clarke wished she hadn't let that information slip, considering the rocky relationship they'd had since Lexa had gone missing shortly after a visit from her mother, who seemed to be much more than a meager geneticist.

"Yeah, my mom and a few business partners have been researching this for about 25 years now," Clarke admitted. "I don't know if she knows how to reverse it, though. Everything has been merely theoretical until now. I'm about to go to her office, see if maybe I can volunteer some of my DNA for testing. You're welcome to accompany me if you're willing to have a bit of bloodwork done as well."

Octavia looked distasteful of the invitation, but nodded anyway, for some reason that Clarke didn't understand. She headed over to the ratty coat rack and grabbed a purse, sticking her phone inside and looked at Clarke expectantly.

"Lead the way, Princess," She joked, and Clarke headed out to the car with a very confident Octavia behind her.

**LEXA** didn't know where she was. She knew the room around her was concrete, with a layer of lead lining every wall except the one that had a window into the observation room. The procaution of lead was for the better, she thought, because her powers were dangerous and unstable, and she had no way of stopping the impending explosion that pulsed through her veins.

She looked at the glass window into an observation room and saw the mother of the girl she couldn't help but fall for. She looked and she saw Abby Griffin, writing on a clipboard as she observed her behavior. Lexa felt her hands get hot, and when she looked down at them, they were pulsing with light that backlit the blue of her veins. She closed her eyes, envisioning something calming. She thought about the forest that she had visited on a girlscouts trip as a kid, of the waterfall they had all seen as a group. She felt herself calm down, and she locked eyes with Abby through the glass.

"You can't keep me here," Lexa said, voice as steady as she could make it, "You're friends with my father. You know me, , you know that I wouldn't hurt anyone."

Abby was indifferent to the girl's protests, simply tapping on her clipboard a few times before placing it down on a table and walking to the glass.

"You are responsible for the death of dozens in your apartment building, Lexa," Abby said stiffly. "The amounts of radiation that you put out due to your ability could endanger everyone around you. This isn't personal, Lexa, this is about keeping the people around you safe."

Lexa knew this was true, and her heart broke as she thought about the faces that she would see daily when she went out the door. She had befriended Indra, the outspoken woman from across the hall, had that resulted in her neighbor's death?

"How is Clarke?" Lexa spoke up, looking at Abby boldly, not showing the pain she felt about causing the deaths of so many just by existing near them,

"Clarke is fine, Lexa. She's a strong girl," Abby said, maybe with a hint of guilt for locking up her daughter's roommate.

"That she is," Lexa replied, standing up in her small cell and moving to her bed in the corner. "If you could, Abby, have my father drop by a few books from my apartment, a laptop even, if that's not too much to ask. I've decided that if I'm going to be here for a while I might as well get something done."

Abby only nodded before leaving the small observation room, and Lexa was left alone in the lead-lined once again.

**MONTY** was seriously conscerned about what Jasper thought about in his free time. His thoughts managed to fly by at a mile per minute, all ranging from his girlfriend Maya to something trivial like his favorite dog breeds.

"I'm kind of glad I don't read minds," Jasper said as he pulled into the parking lot of their apartment. "I don't even want to know what you think about Miller."

Monty tried to hide his embarassment as he got out of the car, heading over to the elevator and pressing the UP button.

"I still don't understand why you think we're a couple," Monty said while attempting to keep a straight face. It wasn't like he and Miller were a couple... yet. They had been talking about the prospect of just that for months and just couldn't seem to find a good way to officially date. Monty knew he would be in for a big "I told you so" from Jasper if they ever actually went through with a relationship.

Monty watched as Jasper stared down the clock on the wall as if willing it to move faster.

"You do know the Elevator doesn't take that long to arrive, right? We're not in a rush," Monty reminded him. As if to prove his point, the Elevator light lit up and rang out a ding into the parking garage.

Jasper nodded as the boarded the elevator together, and Monty could hear him thinking about something that had happened earlier.

"You moved the clock forward?" Monty asked, wondering if Jasper had an ability as well.

"It seemed like it," Jasper replied, attempting to seem indifferent. "I think I just thought it happened. Honestly I dont think I can do anything again until I can get a nap. I'm sleep deprived, can't you tell?"

Monty looked at Jasper and decided that was probably true, and when the elevator landed on the sixth floor they walked together to their apartment. Monty headed towards their desk and opened up their desktop, wanting to get information about whatever was going on with his new ability to read minds.

Jasper walked into his bedroom and started snoring shortly after.

"Well, laptop, I guess it's just me and you," Monty sighed as he looked up stories of people going through similar situations, trying to decide which were plausible and which were hoaxes. Most were the latter.

**BELLAMY** was working the register, helping the few people who still relied on this video store to provide the fuel for movie night. After an old couple left, the store was quiet, daylight streaming in through the windows around the front of the store near the register.

He had nothing to do, so he started going through the records of the past month, wanting to know how intense of a paycut he would recieve this month. Due to the outdated electronics that the old store had yet to replace, pulling up the records would take an unreasonable amount of time, but he pulled it up anyway.

Bellamy heard the bells above the door ring as someone new entered, an older guy with a scar on his mouth. He'd never been in the shop before, but there's a first time for anything. His skin appeared to be clammy, cheeks flushed and eyes dull. This guy looked sick, and Bellamy did not have time for whatever sickness he had.

"You okay?" Bellamy asked from behind the desk. The guy covered his ears as if Bellamy had just screamed into them.

"Just... shut up, okay?" The guy pleaded, covering his ears even more tightly and squeezing his eyes shut.

"You're not looking too great right now. Should I call someone?" Bellamy continued, picking up a phone from the reciever and preparing to dial a number.

"I said to shut up," The man repeated, this time holding up a gun to prove his point. Bellamy felt his heart beat at an alarming rate as the man walked closer.

"I need somewhere to hide out, and this is the only place in the area that I don't think anyone would come to. Cooperate or I'll shoot, got it? Don't speak, just nod," The man said forcefully, stepping behind the desk where Bellamy stood.

Bellamy nodded, hands not leaving the phone in his hands.

"What did you do?" Bellamy asked as quietly as possible, cringing at how shaky and afraid his voice sounded.

The man grimaced at the words said, and glared at Bellamy.

"I cut open a man's head and devoured part of his brain so I could gain a superpower that might not even be real," The man said with a sick sort of pride.

Bellamy nodded, heart leaping into his throat as he started to dial the police on the phone. Apparently, though, the man could hear.

"I thought I told you to cooperate?" He chastized as he lifted to gun to face Bellamy's chest and promptly shot him four times.

The computer beeped as an electronic file read, "Records Found."

Too late, Bellamy thought as he fell against the desk, hand grabbing at his Video Palace vest, fingers wet with fresh blood.

The last thought that crossed Bellamy's mind before he hit the floor was how disappointed that Octavia would be when she learned that he died because he couldn't shut up.

**OCTAVIA** never got calls from the Video Palace unless it was serious. That's why when those two words appeared on her caller ID her heart skipped a beat. She knew Bellamy worked in a bad part of town, and she knew that he had a hero complex that couldn't be stopped. That's why she gripped her seatbelt tightly as she answered the phone

"Bellamy?" She asked shakily into the phone, worried that it wouldn't be him this time.

"O, where are you?" Bellamy asked into the phone, breath uneven between his words.

"I'm in the car with Clarke, we're driving to meet her mom at her office. Are you okay Bell?" Octavia answered, ultimately reverting the conversation back to her worries about her brother's situation.

"It's hard to explain," Bellamy said after a long pause. "Could you have Clarke swing by Video Palace to take me with you two?"

Octavia turned to Clarke and mentioned Bellamy's request, which Clarke quickly accepted and asked for directions. Octavia began to direct her to Video Palace, still worried about what Bellamy had gotten into this time. As soon as they arrived Octavia rushed in, almost retching at the metallic smell of blood in the air.

She saw Bellamy standing against one of the movie racks, face going pale when she noticed the bloodied holes that were in the front of his shirt.

"Oh my god, Bell," She muttered, rushing to where he stood before Bellamy could protest. "We need to get you to a hospital, this is bad."

"I'm fine, Octavia," Bellamy replied steadily. Octavia gave him an incredulous look as she put his arm over her shoulder to help him out.

"You got shot, Bellamy," She yelled. "How is that fine?"

Bellamy shrugged his arm off of her and lifted his shirt. The blood was there, the bullet holes were not.

"I guess healing runs in the family," He said, trying to explain it to himself as well.

"Who did this?" Octavia asked, the worry passing through her and leaving her simmering with rage. Had her brother not healed he would almost definitely been dead, and whoever attempted to put him in that condition would suffer the wrath of his sister.

"He's been dealt with O, don't worry," Bellamy reassured, eyes flickering behind the desk a few times.

"You killed him, didn't you?" Octavia asked, eyes going wide.

"I did what I had to do," Bellamy said as he headed out the door and to Clarke's car, ignoring Octavia's warnings about getting blood on Clarke's upholstered seats.

Octavia stayed behind, itching to look at the aftermath of the double murder behind the desk. When she looked back there she found nothing but a blood stain on the ground and a gun.

Taken aback, Octavia slowly exited, ignoring the feeling that she was being watched until she got into the car.

Bellamy must have noticed her unsteady expression, because he turned back and gave her a puzzled look.

"Everything okay?" Bellamy asked her, grabbing her hand.

"I guess so," Octavia said, the memory of what had made her so shaken in the first place had slipped her mind. "If it was important I wouldn't have forgotten though, right?"

Bellamy nodded and turned back to Clarke, who restarted the car and pulled back onto the main road.

"So we're headed to your mom's office?" Bellamy asked Clarke, who glanced between Bellamy and the road ever so often.

"Yes," Clarke answered simply. After the moment of silence that followed, Clarke decided to elaborate. "My mom's a geneticist. She and a few partners have been researching genetic anomalies like this for a while. She'll be interested about Octavia and I, but I think the really important one here is Bellamy."

"Why Bellamy?" Octavia asked, "Doesn't he have the same powers I have?"

Clarke shrugged, pulling to a stop when the traffic light went red.

"It appears that way now, but the way I painted him portrayed him with multiple powers. I'm guessing that he can alter his own DNA and take the powers of others," Clarke explained to the siblings.

"I guess there's one way to find out," Octavia remarked as the light turned green and they proceeded on their journey to New York.

**RAVEN** had arrived at the New York branch of ARK Research Center at precisely 4:02 in the afternoon, still dressed in a grease stained tee shirt that read the name of the family garage and a pair of baggy boyfriend jeans. She saw a guy sitting at a desk, so she headed over.

"Are you the secretary or something?" She asked the guy behind the desk with the sandy blonde hair. He looked up and laughed, handing her a clipboard to sign in with.

"I guess you could call me that," he replied. "I'm Kyle, most people just call me Wick." Raven raised an eyebrow as she wrote her name onto the clipboard, stating her reason for coming as the discovery of telekenetic powers. She looked at the words and scribbled them out, instead writing that she had discovered a new ability.

"What kind of nickname is Wick?" Raven asked, sliding the clipboard back to him.

"And what kind of name is Raven Reyes? Sounds pretentious to me," He joked, watching as she headed away from the desk and to one of the uncomfortable looking chairs lining the walls. "It's my last name, by the way. If you were actually wondering."

"Your name is Kyle Wick? Doesn't roll off the tongue right, don't you think?" She said as she grabbed a far too outdated magazine from a table and opened it to an article that she didn't actually care about.

Wick laughed from behind the desk, pressing a button to call Abby in to deal with the matter of the telekenetic girl. "I guess you're right. You should ask my mom about her questionable choices."

"I would, if I cared," Raven retorted, looking up from the article to lock eyes with him. She watched as he stayed quiet, turning to his computer to a bit before facing her once more.

"Your a mechanic, aren't you? That's what your shirt said, at least," He commented, earning an eye roll from Raven, who finally decided to give up on trying to read the magazine.

"Wow, great guess. You nailed it," She replied sarcastically, wondering when the damned doctor would rescue her from this torture.

"Wanna know how I guessed? Beside the shirt, I mean," He pressed on, wanting her attention. Raven sighed, raising an eyebrow as an invitation to tell her how he guessed. "You've got the attitude of a grease monkey. You might not notice, but I do."

"Let me guess, engineer?" Raven said exhasperatedly, clasping her hands together in front of her. She saw his nod and leaned back in her chair. "Not suprising, never hard to spot one of you. You've got the aura of self importance."

Before their conversation could progress, Abby Griffin walked into the office with a mildly agitated expression on her face.

"You didn't schedule an appointment Ms-" She trailed off, picking up the clipboard from the desk to learn the name of the girl who supposedly had an ability, "Ms. Reyes. You're lucky we're not full today."

"Sorry, Dr. Griffin," Raven said as she stood and extended her hand in greeting, which Abby pretended not to notice. "I figured that it was urgent."

"You wrote here you have an ability," Abby said, looking up at the girl in front of her. "I'd like you to demonstrate it."

Raven looked at her with wide eyes, worried she wouldn't be able to get the abilities to work and that she'd be kicked out. "Right here?" She asked, looking from Abby to WIck, who was seriously interested in the conversation.

"This is as good of a place as any. Besides, there isn't any important equipment in here that you could destroy, should your power be unstable," Abby explained, growing tired of Raven's stalling. Raven nodded and closed her eyes to concentrate, when she opened her eyes, she made the magazine she had read earlier float in mid air, turning the pages one by one with her mind. She made the magazine go back to the table and turned to Abby.

"That's it," She said, crossing her arms and waiting for Abby's response.

"You discovered these powers today?" Abby asked, uptight expression replaced with shock.

"Yeah, I found out at work today," Raven answered, wondering why it was relevant.

Abby opened the door behind her and led Raven through a corridor of rooms, opening the last door in the hall, revealing a nice office with a view of the city. Abby sat down at a large desk and gestsured for Raven to sit at the chair in front of her. As Raven sat, she glanced out the window, getting a glimpse of Central Park in the distance.

"It's a beautiful view, isn't it?" Abby asks, pulling out a few papers from within her desk. Raven glanced at the papers warily when she saw all the places to sign. These contracts were long and wordy, and Raven was afraid she would be pressured into signing without getting a chance to really read them.

"I guess we should get to business now, shouldn't we?" Abby said when she noticed Raven eyeing the papers. Raven nodded, and Abby slid the contracts over to her.

"We want to study your brain, Raven. See how everything is working in there. People with abilities like yours are evidence of evolution, and we want to pinpoint the reason for these changes," Abby explained, keeping eyecontact with Raven, who seemed to be taking the information well. "We just want to do a few tests, keep you in our facility while we do so. It's nothing dangerous or harmful to you, we just want to see how you tick."

Raven swallowed hard, glancing out the window again before turning back to Abby, "I'm in. Where do I sign?"

**MONTY** had finally come to a breakthrough. After reading a pirated copy of a geneticist's book online, Monty was pointed in the director of ARK Research Center, Abby Griffin. Through e-mail, Monty explain his situation and how he had discovered it, recieving a hasty reply inviting him to visit the office for an examination. After scheduling an appointment in an hour, Monty went to wake Jasper, who was fast asleep while still wearing his polo with the company logo emblazoned on it.

"Hey Jasper," Monty said as he sat down, nudging his roommate. Jasper begrudgingly woke up, moving to sit up beside his friend. "I found a doctor that would help me figure out how to deal with my new ability. I figured that you would want to come with me."

"Yeah, where does this doctor work?" Jasper asked, changing from his polo into an old band tee shirt that he had bought from a secondhand store.

"New York," Monty explained, grabbing a shirt of similar origin from Jasper's closet and changing into it. Jasper wouldn't mind, after all. "You've heard of ARK Research Centers, haven't you?"

Jasper nodded, running a hand through his hair and heading back to the living room, Monty following behind.

"When do we have to be there?" Jasper asked, secretly wondering if he had time to grab some lunch from a fast food chain.

"In an hour," Monty replied. "And no, Jasper, I'd rather we not stop for food."

Japer sighed and grabbed Monty's arm to pull him along.

"Let's go," Jasper said, and suddenly they weren't in the shabby hall of their appartment building, but they had somehow been transported to Time Square, bright and crowded with tourists who weren't concerned in the slightest about how the two boys had gotten there.

"Did you do that?" Monty asked, eyes wide.

Jasper shook his head, not knowing if he had actually transported them into New York. Monty broke into a laugh, and Jasper did the same, no doubt looking ridiculous to the people around them.

"Jasper? Monty?" A female voice said behind them. They both turned, finding themselves face to face with a blonde haired girl. Monty noticed that her clothes were nice while her hands were stained with charcoal and paint, an artist, most likely.

"Do we know you?" Monty asked, looking at the stranger in front of him. The girl wasn't having it, crossing her arms and giving them a look of annoyance.

"Now is not the time for jokes. Cage is still out in the city and you two had time to change clothes? You're coming back right now. Bellamy thinks he's pinpointed the time of the explosion. We need to hurry," the blonde said, not caring about the strange looks from the people around her.

"Look, lady, we literally don't know you," Jasper said, almost snapped, actually. A look of realization passed over the Blonde's face, and she walked closer, expression softening.

"What month is it?" She asked, voice not losing its serious tone, but still less severe.

"It's August, August 5th," Monty replied wondering why that was even a question. The blonde turned to Jasper, an intense expression on her face.

"You've jumped forward a few months, because right now it's November. Go back to March and go to Abby Griffin's office. It's important that we all meet there that day. Don't listen to a word that woman says, but don't let her or anyone around you know that ARK is corrupt. Everything relies on you, Jasper," she said before turning to leave.

"What's your name?" Monty asked. The blonde turned back for a moment and gave a grin that was so different from her serious actions from only moments ago.

"Go to Abby's office and find out, why don't you?" She called before heading off in the other direction.

So Jasper grabbed onto Monty's arm and took them back to New York in the right time, and as they walked into the office they saw a familiar blonde head of hair.


	2. Part Two

**LEXA** could feel her veins igniting with pure nuclear power as she was forced to lie down on a metal table in the middle of the room by a doctor in a hazmat suit, eyes going wide as he noticed the ethereal glow that she had begun to take on.

"Settle down, Lexa," A man said. She looked up, a wave of shock going through her body as she looked at the face of the man who had devastated the lives of everyone with his death. Apparently, though, that had been false.

"You died," Lexa said, looking into Jake Griffin's eyes as he approached. "You died and I was the one who had to be there for Clarke as she suffered." The glow of nuclear energy reappeared as her anger resurfaced, this time it was hotter and even brighter than before. The doctor slipped a needle into Lexa's arm and injected a sedative, and she felt her senses and reflexes dull as she slipped into a state between sleep and being lucid.

"The faking of my death was for the benefit of everyone around," Jake said as he pulled a cart of metal objects towards where Lexa was lying. She could hear him as he prepped the metals, scraping them together and making a metallic screech ring through the air. "That way I can devote my full amount of time to figuring out how to stop your kind from overrunning ours."

Lexa's eyes went wide as she watched a sharp metal object get closer and closer to piercing into her skin.

"Please," she pleaded, looking at the thin blade that the doctor was bringing closer and closer to her skin,"Don't do this."

Jake Griffin was indifferent to her request, giving the doctor a quick nod. Before Lexa could react she was flipped over, the bottom of her plain grey shirt lifted to expose her lower back, right where the ridges of her spine were barely visible through her skin.

"Make the incision," Mr. Griffin ordered.

Even in Lexa's weak state, she could scream, but with the thick lining of the room it wasn't likely that anyone could hear.

**BELLAMY** heard a scream ring through the air and jumped in his seat, looking around the office for the source of the sound.

"Did you hear that?" Bellamy asked Octavia, on her phone in the seat beside him.

The screams were unrelenting and pained, and Bellamy wondered just what was in store for them behind those doors.

"Hear what, Bell?" Octavia asked, her voice louder than usual.

"You can keep it down, you know," Bellamy said in a whisper, almost wanting to cover his ears.

"I'm talking as quietly as I can," she said, eyebrow raised.

Bellamy thought back to Video Palace, the man who had been complaining about just how loud everything was before he shot Bellamy in the chest far too many times. What if Clarke was right about him absorbing the powers of the people around him?

"Are you ok?" Clarke asked, breaking him from his thoughts in far too loud of a voice, at least to him, anyway. Bellamy gave a nod, listening to the sounds around him he was having trouble tuning out, like the 80's rock music blaring from the headphones of the guy behind the desk, like the whir of the air vent above them, like Clarke's heartbeat with the occasional skip.

"I think you were right, Clarke," he said, taking deeper breaths in attempt to reign in the intensity that the new hearing had. "The man who attacked me had some sort of super hearing, I guess, and I think I might've picked up on that ability."

"What makes you think that?" Clarke asked. Bellamy gave a sigh of relief when the volume of her question was normal, proving that he had managed to bring the power down to a healthy level.

"Because I know that the secretary is listening to Separate Ways by Journey and that you've been having heart palpitations," he explained, turning to where Clarke sits beside him. "Nervous, Clarke?"

She shook her head, brushing off his comment.

"I'm fine," She responded, but Bellamy heard as he heartbeat sped up. Liar.

Another scream pierced through the air. He could tell it was distant. If it was really close it would have physically pained him to hear.

"Clarke, I think there's someone in trouble here," Bellamy said, nudging Clarke to get her attention.

"Did you hear something?" Clarke asked, less surprised than Bellamy would have expected.

"A scream, female, on this floor, but it sounded distant," Bellamy said, listening as another desperate, animalistic scream rang through the air.

"As soon as I get Wick over there to call my mom in here we'll go back, and you can find the source of the screams," Clarke tells Bellamy, giving his hand a reassuring pat. "Don't be mad if I delay talking to him for a bit longer, though."

**CLARKE** had somehow earned the attention of two guys that she vaguely recognized (from a vision, perhaps), but didn't know. They sat on the left side of her while Bellamy and Octavia were to her right, and she could feel their eyes on her no matter how much she tried to ignore their frenzied whispers and "accidental" bumps into her arm.

"Can I help you?" She finally asked, turning to face the one closest to her, the Asian one with the faded Battlestar Galactica tee shirt. He glanced back at his friend, who gave him a quick elbow to the side, leading to more bickering between themselves and less staring at Clarke, which she was thankful for.

"You think they're here for the same reason?" Octavia whispered, glancing over at the two friends who had gotten engaged in what appeared to be an intense staring contest, that or they were communicating with just facial expressions.

Clarke shrugged, "I don't know another reason why someone would visit a geneticist."

"So this isn't as uncommon as you thought," Bellamy states. "I mean, all three of us can do extraordinary things, and I assume those two over there can do something. Can you think of a reason why it would appear so suddenly?"

Clarke tried to think but came up with nothing, "Trust me, if I knew that answer I wouldn't have come to my mom. I'd like to keep as much distance as I can." Bellamy gave a look that seemed to ask why, but she quickly escaped that conversation by walking to the desk.

"Funny seeing you here, Clarke," Wick said, taking out headphones and giving Clarke a smile that she didn't return.

"I need my mom and you can get that done. That will be the end of our association," Clarke said simply, crossing her arms as she watched him press the call button on the desk.

"You know, it isn't actually my fault that I got this job instead of you, right?" Wick said slowly, leaning back in the chair. "Besides, I have half a mind to quit. Between you and me, I see people go behind those doors and more often than not they don't come back."

Clarke swallowed hard and gave a quick glance back to the Blake siblings and the bickering friends, wondering just what was in store.

"When you go back look for a girl who just went back. Tan, dark hair pulled into a ponytail, telekinetic," Wick continued just before Abby Griffin opened the door into the lobby and stopped all conversation.

"Clarke," she said, eyes wide in suprise as she discovered her daughter's appearance in her office. "I haven't seen you in-"

"Since Lexa went missing," Clarke interrupted, giving her mom a cold look before regaining her composure. "I brought some people that I think you'll be interested in."

"Well, introduce us," Abby insisted, looking between the four people still seated in the uncomfortable chairs.

"Mom, meet the Blakes," Clarke said as the siblings strode to Dr. Griffin and extended a hand towards her.

As Abby shook both of their hands, she studied them intensely. "What business do you two have with a geneticist?" Abby asked the siblings.

Octavia stepped up, explaining her powers in great detail to the doctor.

"And you?" Abby asked Bellamy.

"My best guess is that I can absorb the powers of the people around me," Bellamy answered in a way that Clarke believed was apprehensive. "I can heal like Octavia, and I apparently mimicked the powers of a man who was hiding out where I work."

"Alright," Abby said with a nod, giving a quick glance back to Clarke. "And why are you here, Clarke?"

Clarke shifted back and forth on her feet, wondering if she should just lie and say she was a friend who had taken them to the only person she knew who could help. Under her mother's sharp gaze she couldn't lie, so she admitted to her ability.

"It seems that I can paint the future. That's how I found Bellamy and Octavia in the first place," she said warily, looking at the floor before glancing back up at Abby, whose face seemed to be glowing with pride.

"I thought you would be one of them," Abby said to Clarke, putting a hand on her shoulder that Clarke quickly shrugged off.

"Why?" Clarke asked, but all her mother did was turn back to the Blakes.

"Let's continue this conversation in my office, shall we?" Abby offered, opening the heavy wooden door into the halls that led to multiple other rooms.

Abby went through the threshold first, then Bellamy, then Octavia, and finally Clarke, who met Kyle's gaze one final time before she went in, the heavy door slamming behind her.

**RAVEN** sat in a chair by the window of Abby's office, filling out forms to allow Dr. Griffin to perform minor tests on her and to study her DNA. The doctor had also offered her a suite in the same building to stay in while she taught Raven to control her powers. Raven accepted; partly because she had wanted to protect the people from her crazy telekinetic drama, but also because she had been offered a fully furnished apartment with anything she could need, no expenses.

Raven heard the door open and looked up, watching as two strangers and one extremely familar face enter. She made quick eye contact with Octavia and offered a wave, which Octavia didn't return, instead she gestured to the boy beside her. Raven understood completely. Raven worked nights at Drop Ship Diner and enjoyed it, no matter how ridiculous the name was. During her nights there she noticed Octavia frequenting with an older guy, and as Octavia grew to be a regular she learned that they had a bit of a secret relationship.

Raven couldn't keep from eavesdropping, especially if Octavia happened to be in the same boat she was in. Besides, it was Abby's fault for allowing her to stay in the room while she filled out her paperwork.

"So," Abby said as she sat down, grabbing three stacks of paper that looked identical to Raven's from her desk, "You possess the ability to heal any wound?"

Octavia nodded and Raven felt a twinge of jealousy before she remembered that she was telekinetic. She looked down at the forms as Abby began to ramble on about genetics and went into the same speech that Raven had heard only half an hour ago. Some people were born with powers, others were given synthetic abilities. There was no telling who had been given powers.

"That's bullshit," The guy of the trio said as he listened to Abby's nonchalant explanation. "If that was the case this would be a pandemic."

Raven raised an eyebrow. That guy was smart, and whatever the hell they were dealing with, she felt like he would be the one to keep everything steady.

Then Clarke opened her mouth.

"A pandemic is what would happen if this was a sickness. This is a genetic alteration. Irreversible. No cure. Most likely, it's more common than we think. We should be working with the people here to collect everyone who has displayed a sign of this genetic mutation," Clarke said matter-of-factly. Raven wasn't fond of the girl's tone, but, damn, she was smart and she was right.

"We're past that stage, Clarke," Abby cut in swiftly. "Someone working for us has already developed a program that can name anyone who has this alteration in their code. The company has been debating for months now, but I think it's time we use it."

Octavia slumped back in her seat and rubbed a hand over her face like the whole conversation was exhausting her.

"You really think that all that needs to been done is informing them? We need to inform the world about what's happening. This could be a sign of evolution as a race, and if the world finds out in a bad way we're all screwed," Octavia barked at Abby.

"The company has decided that it's best for everyone with these abilities to lay low and keep their powers a secret. It's for the good of everyone, really. We wouldn't want to cause a mass hysteria," Abby said in an attempt to correct Octavia's thinking.

Raven raised an eyebrow, already knowing about Octavia's strong will. She waited and waited for Octavia to counter like she always does, and she swore she could have heard a pin drop.

"I can't die, I can regenerate my limbs. I could donate blood or bone marrow to people who need it and possibly save their lives." Octavia said in a sharp tone. "I think something else is going on here and you're covering for something."

"And what would that be, Ms. Blake?" Abby asked calmly.

The guy sitting next to Octavia grabbed her wrist and gave her a nod.

"We'll find out," he said, glancing at Abby with an odd expression.

Raven finished her paperwork and stood up from her seat, walking to Abby apprehensively and placed all the paperwork on the desk.

"Sorry to interrupt, Dr. Griffin, but if I'm going to do this I need to get home and pack up my things," Raven said, feeling the eyes of the group on her as she stepped between the desk and their chairs.

Abby nodded and put the paperwork in a separate drawer before looking back to Raven.

"Get home and pack your things," Abby told her. "When you get back I'll have someone in the lobby that will take you to your temporary apartment."

Raven nodded and left the room, heading down the hall and back into the lobby. Before she could leave the room, the guy behind the desk just didn't keep his mouth closed.

"Leaving already? What's the rush?" He asked.

As Raven turned around, she caught a glimpse of two guys around Octavia's age who were playing Mario Kart on handheld game consoles while they waited. She almost laughed, then she remembered she needed to reply to Wick with something funny. "I would've stayed longer, but I just couldn't stand being within fifty feet of you."

"So that's how you're going about this?" Wick asked, a grin forming on his face. Raven wondered why the hell he was smiling like this was a game, but she realized that, to him, it was.

"Yes, Wick, that's exactly how I'm playing it. Now, if you'll excuse me I have packing to do," Raven said, faltering as she noticed how his face went pale when she mentioned packing.

"You're actually accepting that housing deal?" Wick asked, suddenly serious and practically leaning over the counter.

Raven nodded, crossing her arms and, waiting for an explanation for how paranoid he was being. When she didn't recieve one, she cleared her throat. "Well?"

"It's probably nothing," Wick said, giving a quick gesture to the security camera in the lobby, which Raven quickly understood. "Let me walk you to your car?"

Raven nodded, and Wick dissappeared from behind the desk, coming out from the heavy wooden door and following her out the door.

As the door to the office closed, Raven heard one of the guys shout, "Aw, fuck, you blue shelled me, Monty," and for some strange reason, it really stuck with her as she walked with Wick down to her ratty pick up truck.

**JASPER** had already determined that they had really stepped in it this time. According to blondie from the future (had the doctor called her Clarke?), they were important and needed at some future date, and they couldn't trust the very people they were going to for help. Needless to say, Jasper was confused and worried about the situation. Losing at Mario Kart didn't help.

"Everything will be fine, Jasper," Monty reassured, not looking up from the game as he sped into first place. "In the future we obviously aren't severely injured or dead. The only thing Clarke noticed about us was that we had changed clothes."

"You're right, but I can't help feeling like everything is very, very wrong here," Jasper muttered, cursing as he drove straight into a banana.

"You're not alone in that. Wick from behind the desk has been thinking about how he doesn't think any of us will make it out of here alive. Why do you think he left with that girl?" Monty informed Jasper in a whisper, rapidly pressing buttons on the device to speed up like the conversation was casual.

"I thought he left because he was genuinely being a nice guy and walking to her car," Jasper replied. "You're telling me he left to warn her?"

Monty nodded and finished the final lap in first, sinking back in his chair and nodding. "That's what his thoughts said, at least. I have an idea, though, and you might not be so inclined to try this, but it might work."

Jasper put his DS down and turned to his best friend and roommate, knowing this would probably be the best idea in the world or the idea that would ruin them both. With Monty, there was no in between.

"I want you to pose as me, and I'll say that I'm Jasper, the supportive friend," Monty said slowly, waiting for Jasper to refuse.

"Alright," Jasper said with a nod. "I'll do it. The only problem is if they ask me what they're thinking of and I don't know."

Monty sighed in defeat, knowing that without proof they would be screwed. No one who's a doctor in this field would believe someone who had no proof.

The door opened and a new doctor entered the room, tall, dark-skinned, and seemingly surrounded by an aura of self-importance. Jasper could tell by the look in Monty's eyes that he was already reading the doctor's mind, so Jasper stepped forward to keep attention from his friend.

"Are we not scheduled to meet with Dr. Griffin?"

"Dr. Griffin is busy with a family emergency regarding her daughter. I'm her colleague, Thelonious Jaha," The Doctor extended a hand, and both the boys gave it a wary shake. "If you'll step back into my office."

When the doctor turned around to lead the way to the office, Monty looked over and gave Jasper a brief shake of his head. Yeah, they were screwed.

**BELLAMY** had claimed he needed to take a call and take off from work, the screams becoming a constant background noise in his mind. It seemed there was no one left in the office, so Bellamy was free to explore as much as he could in about a seven minute timeframe. He knew this would be more than enough.

Another scream pierced his ears, this time close enough to make him grasp at the wall as he doubled over, the painful shriek seeming to stab at his skull. After listening to this, Bellamy knew there was no way that ARK's hands were clean.

He was sure he had found the door, the noise couldn't have come from any other source, so Bellamy twisted the knob and threw himself across the threshold, ready to stop the reason the girl had been screaming. Instead, Bellamy found himself in a stairway, empty of anything up and down. He cursed and sunk against the doorframe dejectedly, knowing that if he spent any more time looking for the girl that his absence would be noticeable. He battled between going back to Octavia and Clarke and saving the (presumably) innocent girl. Due to his kind heart, Bellamy chose the latter.

A door creaked open two flights of stairs below him, wide enough for the sounds of drilling and the screaming girl's protests to be heard. "Please, help me," the girl cried, but Bellamy could hear the footsteps moving in his direction as the door slammed shut. Bellamy had nowhere to hide in the alabaster stairway. And he needed one. Fast.

He climbed up two flights of stairs and sat on the nearest platform, hoping the person who left wouldn't be walking in his direction. The footsteps got closer, and bellamy knew that he would be found. Miraculously, though, he wasn't found. The footsteps opened another door and left the stairwell silent aside from Bellamy's heavy breathing.

The he search could continue, and Bellamy stood up and raced down to the door he had heard the screams behind. He rested his head against the door, eyes shut as he focused on the noises coming from inside. He heard the cries of the girl, softer now, weak. He knew that she was reaching a point of no return. He focused harder and heard the voiced of others, a ball bouncing against a wall, sheets rustling, shouting muffled by an unknown surface.

In a swift movement, Bellamy had opened the door, found himself in a long concrete hallway with the word "MECCA" stamped on almost every wall windows were sporadic, occasionally giving Bellamy a view of each doors inhabitants. They looked rough. Not so much in the features, but in their eyes.

He finds the room in the middle of the hall, surrounded by other rooms exactly alike. A man in a hazmat suit stitches up the girl's lower back. He's about to open the door and ask what they were doing to her when he notices that in order to get into the room you would need to type a code into the door. He heard someone tap on the glass behind him and turned, eyes meeting the wild eyes of a long-haired boy trapped behind a door of the same sort.

The prisoner held held up four numbers. 2-0-5-2. The code for the door, Bellamy assumed. As he typed it into the door, Bellamy realized just how unarmed he was, and just how unlikely saving the screaming girl would be. Still, he opened the door, greeted by the Hazmat Doctor who had just taken off the mask.

He couldn't have been much older than Bellamy, and his face was grim as he placed bloodied tools onto the table. His eyebrows furrowed as he examined Bellamy, shirt still pierced with bullet holes, then something strange happened.

"Are you a new employee?" The doctor asked, tone friendly and light. "I'm Jackson, the chief of research. You must be here for your mission, aren't you?"

Bellamy knew the only way he could figure out exactly what the company was up to was to get inside... so he told a simple lie.

"I am, I got a bit lost and ended up here, first day, you know," Bellamy said as confidently as he could. He noticed that Jackson was eyeing his shirt apprehensively, so he added a bit more to the lie. "It's a statement. Fashion won't matter when you're dead."

"Interesting," Jackson said slowly before pushing past the subject. "So you should know that once you get your first mission you'll be assigned a partner. We got a new one today who seems promising. Raven Reyes, telekinetic. I wouldn't be surprised if she was put on the field pretty quickly."

"Oh, really?" Bellamy asked, faking interest when he was really interested in what this guy knew about the plans for Octavia and himself. "Did you get anyone else today? I just join up so I'm a bit behind on the chain emails."

Jackson nodded, "I think Abby is in the process of talking to her daughter and two healing siblings, if Miller in surveillance told me correctly. I'm sure the company has many uses for their cells."

"So they're going to end up like her?" Bellamy asked, gesturing to where an unconscious Lexa lay on the table.

Jackson sighed, looking at the ground. "I feel bad for her, you know? Lexa is a nice girl, but she's dangerous. I would have used anesthetic on her if Mr. Griffin had permitted, but it seems the feud between her family's company and ARK still stands."

"I recognize her," Bellamy muttered as he walked closer to the bed and looked at her expressionless face. Clarke's lock screen. This was Clarke's friend, wasn't it? But if that was true, why was she behind held in such conditions?

"I should head back to the office to get my assignment," Bellamy lied as an excuse to get back to the meeting with Abby. "It was nice meeting you, Jackson."

The doctor nodded and allowed Bellamy to exit the room before he shut the door, and as Bellamy left Mecca he was left to think of a plausible excuse as to why he was gone for ten minutes.

**RAVEN** and Wick had been sitting at a stoplight for what seemed like forever, silence between them since Wick had offered to walk her to her car. She didn't even object when he had gotten into the passenger seat, or even when he changed her alternative rock station to a classic rock station. But what finally made her crack was the heavy weight of not knowing what had scared him so badly.

"What's happening at ARK?" She asked as soon as her foot hit the petal and she continued on the way back to her apartment.

Wick seemed to hesitate, as if not knowing what to share. "It's hard to explain. The company has its agents and they're paired up with someone with abilities. Someone like you. Together they go out to catch others with powers. If their power is dangerous they try to get them to work for the company, but if they refuse they're kept on Mecca, what we like to call Level 5."

"What happens there?" Raven asks, keeping her eyes on the road. She could tell he wasn't inclined to answer, so she pressed on. "I asked a question, Wick, and it involves me. What happens in level 5?"

"Torture, experiments, isolation..." Wick trailed off. "Think of ARK like the Spanish Inquisition. Convert or die."

Raven swallowed hard. "So that's what's in store for me? I go back and have to capture innocent people or I'm one of the freaks they experiment on? What can I do to stop it?"

"Nothing, thanks to me," Wick muttered. Raven glanced over, and Wick explained. "Before I knew what was really going on I made a program that tracks down people exactly like you. I would take it back if I could, but I would be declared an enemy of the ARK and end up in a place worse than Level 5."

"Great, so I just have to act like I'm cooperating?" Raven asked, hitting traffic as they got closer to the apartment building. She noticed a man in the middle of the road, a blue ball of electricity hovering in his hands. "Fuck, is it just me or does that guy look like the opposite of friendly?"

"Unfriendly? Yeah, definitely," Wick said. Raven pulled over the car and started getting out.

"Stay here and try to keep my car from getting hit by anything he throws this way," Raven said as she stepped out of the car.

"Wait! You can't go alone!" Wick protested, getting out of the car as well. Raven put her hands on her hips and rolled her eyes. As if the secretary who didn't even have the courage to destroy a program could help defeat a threatening monster of a man.

"Why the hell not?" Raven asked indignantly. Wick stood beside her, trying to ignore the air of self-importance to her words.

"Company motto," Wick answered confidently. "One of us, one of them. In this case you're the 'them.'"

Raven finally nodded and began to walk down the street, searching for something she could hurl at the man in the middle of the street to knock him unconscious.

"Try that park bench," Wick suggested.

Raven rolled her eyes. "Those are literally attached to the ground, Wick. I'd have to undo all of the screws one by one."

"I'm trying to help," Wick muttered. "I mean, it doesn't look like you have any better ideas."

Raven looked around, knowing that there was something she could throw.

"Chair! I could throw that chair from the diner," Raven whispered excitedly. She looked at it and focused as hard as she could, sending the chair flying from the cafe on the street corner to the middle of the street where it slammed into the guy's head. Brimming with excitement, Raven walked over to see who it was. Up close, he didn't look so threatening. Especially when he looked unconscious and was bleeding from a large gash in his head. Her excited feeling left quickly, and she noticed that his chest wasn't rising and falling with breath.

"Oh my god," She muttered, leaning over him and feeling for a pulse. Unable to find one, she called out for Wick, who rushed over quickly. At this point a crowd had begun to gather around the body. "I think he's dead."

"No, he's not," Wick said as he put a hand to his wrist to check the man's pulse. "He's unconscious, won't be for long, so we need to think of something to keep him detained."

"Soak him in water, he'd be unable to use his power without hurting himself," Raven suggested. Wick ran off to get water while Raven moved the man away from the middle of the street, his breathing growing heavier and his eyelids fluttering. Raven feared he would wake up and retaliate.

"I'm back," Wick said, now carrying a children's beach bucket full of murky water. "Not ideal, but it will do." He poured the bucket of water over the man, soaking him pretty thoroughly. The man's eyes opened quickly, and when he brought the ball of electricity back to his hands he shocked himself, crying out as bolts of electricity ran through his body.

"I'm pretty good at this," Raven said proudly.

"Don't let it get to your head, Reyes. We still need to figure out a way to keep you safe," Wick reminded her as he asked a bystander to call the police.

"What if I hide right under their noses. This could be my cover, Wick, we could be partners. We stopped this guy," Raven insisted. "One of us, one of them."

Kyle sighed, agreeing this was the only way she would be safe. "Yeah,yeah, grease monkey. One of us, one of them."

**CLARKE **could tell that her mother had noticed Bellamy's absence, and it was only a matter of time before she sent someone to find him. As if on queue, he came back into the office, glancing at Clarke and communicating that something bad was going on here with one look.

"What do you need us for, mom?" Clarke asked. "You would have sent us on our way after you explained it if you didn't need us."

"We want to hire you to work for the company. We have a policy we use here. One of us, one of them. You three would be the them, in this case. We pair you with one of our employees and you go out to catch the people with deadly abilities," Abby explained.

"We couldn't use our powers to fight bad guys, mom. I just see the future, Octavia and Bellamy just heal," Clarke argued.

"You're right about not putting you on the field, Clarke. Octavia and Bellamy can't die. They would always come out on top," Abby said.

"We still feel pain, Dr. Griffin. If I get shot I would feel the bullet pierce my skin. Why would I want to do that for a company I don't trust?" Octavia argued.

"Because if you don't work for us, you're the enemy. We can't have people like you just roaming the streets, you could put the entire race in jeopardy," Abby snapped.

Octavia slumped in her seat dejectedly. There wasn't really a way out, was there?

"We'll do it," Clarke said for the group. Bellamy and Octavia looked at her like she was crazy, and she understood. This girl who had just met them hours ago was suddenly making decisions for them. She met Bellamy's eye and gave a barely noticeable nod, and she could tell that he knew the plan.

Good choice.

**MONTY **was pretty pissed. One moment he has a stable job at a phone company and the next he's suddenly playing James Bond for ARK industries. Jasper was just as wary as he was, but they had to agree. When Monty looked into Thelonious Jaha's mind he saw only torture and death when Jasper asked why they couldn't deny the offer. As they walked into the office they were met by the secretary and a brunette that they wouldn't mess with. Following them into the office was Clarke and a brother and sister. Monty listened to all of their thoughts and discovered they all had the same goal. They were all working for the company with hopes to bring it down.

"So, we're all here for the same reason?" Monty said nonchalantly. Jasper smacked him in the arm, but the others responded with nods.

"How do you know?" Clarke asked.

"I can read minds, and I know what you're all thinking and why you're here. We are too," Monty replied simply.

"Okay, this conversation just got really weird," The brunette (with a simply peek into the Wick's mind Monty discovered that her name was Raven) said. "I'm still not used to people having powers."

"None of us are," the dark haired guy standing next to Clarke said. "Yet here we all are."

A silence fell over the group, and Monty could hear what they had all come to realize. They could all work together to achieve their goal. Together, they would take down ARK Industries.

"So," Monty said, grabbing everyone's attention, "Who's up for sushi?"


End file.
